An Interview with Linda Summersea
I survived a childhood on a three-generation family farm that gave me very little and asked for everything. I lived in a constant state of survival mode from a very young age.
My greatest transition was on the campus of the University of Massachusetts (BFA, MFA). It was there I met kindred spirits and developed self-confidence. This led to a long career as a teacher and arts administrator working with youth at risk in Massachusetts and Arkansas public schools—not yet knowing I had also been a youth at risk. In fact, as my memoir illustrates, my childhood depression became body dysmorphic disorder as soon as I was tall enough to see myself in the medicine cabinet mirror.
My first television endeavor was creating, producing, and hosting ArtBreak, an award-winning art program for children on community access television in Fayetteville, AR.
My first radio production was a radio narrative re: my disabled Vietnam Vet husband’s experiences in ‘Nam, (including the music they listened to) for Voice of Vashon (WA) radio KVSH 101.9.
Soon, I began to crave the act of writing, something that had been encouraged by my teachers. I began with a piece on NPR’s Tales from the South and in various online periodicals. At the same time, I created and implemented art teaching residencies for museums and community centers.
At sixty-seven, an age when most people slow down, I discovered my passion for expedition hiking by walking fifty miles in the Moroccan desert with Berber nomads. The following year, I developed breast cancer. While I was healing in my bed, I received an email inviting me to join a small group, three-week, uncharted expedition across Kazakhstan, Siberia, and Mongolia the following September. I wrote back: “Sign me up!” My childhood survival, it turns out, was just the beginning.
In September 2023, two weeks before it all went to hell in Gaza, I was floating in the Dead Sea, looking east to Jerusalem from Jordan, where I was part of a six-person women’s expedition that included our Palestinian guide.
In 2025, I celebrated the publication of my coming-of-age memoir, The Girl with the Black and Blue Doll, at the age of seventy-five.
I have now relocated to the place where I felt my first indications of self, the Pioneer Valley of western Massachusetts. I have almost conquered my body dysmorphic disorder.
Tell us the story of your book’s title. Was it easy to find, or did it take forever?
My memoir’s title, The Girl with the Black and Blue Doll, was a spontaneous, easy choice.
When I was hiding under the bed at age three, falling off a stone wall at age six, or other daily mishaps, I occasionally found a bruise blooming on my body. When that happened, I dug a black Magic Marker out of our kitchen junk drawer and drew a black mark of solidarity on my Betsy Wetsy doll’s body.
How did it feel when you first saw your book cover? Or when you first held your book in your hands?
I was pleased, happy, and relieved.
Who/what made you want to write?
I have loved words ever since my first day of first grade—the day I learned to read.
Throughout my school years, my teachers encouraged my writing.
Was there a particular person, or particular writers/works/art forms that influenced you?
Yes, it was when I heard Angela’s Ashes’ author Frank McCourt interviewed on NPR’s
All Things Considered. He published his first book at age sixty-six after thirty years of teaching.
This statement was my wake-up call. It was not too late for me! I began to write my own memoir. After eight drafts and a complete developmental edit over a dozen years, my memoir was published in November 2025 at age seventy-five.
What other professions have you worked in?
In addition to teaching, I was an entrepreneur, founding a business in 1981 that my sons run today.
What was the most rewarding/meaningful part of publishing your book?
The feelings of accomplishment and relief. I was wrong about the relief. I thought I might be able to pay my bills and finally exhale instead of living in daily fear.
Unfortunately, my memoir has a very low rank in Amazon because I’m unable to afford advertising. I’ve done quite a few podcasts and interviews, but that hasn’t enabled book sales.
If your book had a soundtrack, what are some songs that would be on it?
My book does have a soundtrack! I created it September 29, 2020 on Spotify.
Significant songs: Big Girls Don’t Cry, Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons; Stand By Me, Ben E. King; House of the Rising Sun, The Animals; Paint It Black, The Rolling Stones; Piece of My Heart, Big Brother and the Holding Company with Janis Joplin; Fire and Rain, James Taylor; All Along the Watchtower, Jimi Hendrix; Nights in White Satin, The Moody Blues; and Old Man, Neil Young.
What is one thing you hope readers take away from reading your book?
Resilience is stronger than circumstance, and we all have more resilience than we know.
How do you envision your perfect reader?
I’m not sure that there is a “perfect” reader. I believe it will have the most meaning for those who are struggling or have struggled with life, but hasn’t everyone experienced personal struggles?
Jack Canfield read my book and wrote the testimonial that’s on the back cover:
“The Girl with the Black and Blue Doll is a moving coming-of-age story and a powerful testament to a girl’s determination to overcome unbelievably difficult circumstances and finally succeed. I loved reading this book. I couldn’t stop turning the pages. I believe it will someday make a great movie … but don’t wait for that—read it now!” Jack Canfield, coauthor of the #1 New York Times bestselling Chicken Soup for the Soul series and The Success Principles: How to Get from Where You Are to Where You Want to Be
What creative projects are you currently working on?
Unfortunately, I’m in survival mode. My spam folder is full of impersonators and scammers seeking to con me out of my money in exchange for book promotion. They are bold and unrelenting. One had the audacity to claim she was J. K. Rowling, wanting to work with me on a writing project!
Needless to say, since ninety percent of them are fakers with Gmail addresses, copying and pasting details from my book descriptions into an email with glowing comments, I’m forced to check authenticity before “read, block, delete.” Someday, I would love to write about what it’s like to lose everything I ever worked for at age seventy-two and begin life again from the bottom.
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